


Giving Up Ghosts

by orphan_account



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: AU, M/M, Magical Realism, Minor Character Death, Pushing Daisies AU, slight angst
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-11-24
Updated: 2012-11-24
Packaged: 2017-11-19 09:20:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,263
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/571717
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When he is ten years old, John Watson discovers that he can bring dead things back to life. But as with all gifts, there is a price to be paid.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Giving Up Ghosts

**Author's Note:**

> This story is inspired by the TV show "Pushing Daisies." Though it is not necessary for you to have seen "Pushing Daisies" to be able to understand this fic, I fully recommend you watch it anyways. It's gorgeous and flawless and makes me happy beyond belief. Plus Lee Pace.

At this very moment on the “Miraculous Voyages” cruise ship, John Watson was ten years, seven months, twenty-three days, eight hours, and fourteen minutes old. His father, Harold Watson, was thirty-two years, one month, eleven days, thirteen hours, and six minutes old… and not a minute older.

It was mid July, and the sun tarnished everything in bright, vivid colors as John played happily near the rail. Suddenly, he heard a dull thud and a crack, and he spun ‘round quickly to see what had happened. There lay his father, sprawled at the bottom of a short flight of steps, his head craned to the left at an unearthly angle – clearly and completely dead.

John stared, his blue eyes wide, his small heart hammering in his chest, and thought that this would be an ideal moment for something miraculous to happen.

He waited.

When no heavenly chorus floated down to save his beloved dad, John walked quietly over to the body and knelt down, his small frame shaking with confused anguish.

A breath in, a breath out. John thought that such things seemed entirely too simple, and realized how complicated it all was – much more complicated than he had always supposed. Filled with dread, he hovered his hand over his father’s lips, searching for the tell-tale sign of complicated in-and-out breathing.

There was nothing. John pulled his hand away.

He wondered, through his shock addled haze, why the snapping of his father’s neck as he tumbled down those stairs had resulted in the cessation of his life. Where was the link? What was the connection? How could one little break ruin the entire body forever?

Terrified and tremulous, John reached out again, and pressed a finger against the odd lump distending his father’s suntanned neck.

In that moment, John felt a tingle, like a small electric current, sizzle through his finger and spread out, golden and warm, underneath his father’s skin.

Harold Watson’s eyes opened, he got laboriously to his feet, and John watched in astonishment as his father brushed himself off and smiled down at his son.

“Must’ve slipped,” he said dazedly, “lucky I didn’t break my neck, eh?”

John stared unblinkingly at the distinctly bone-like lump still pressing against the side of his father’s neck, but decided not to mention it. Instead, he followed his father across the deck, and wondered if he was going insane.

Forty-seven seconds later, young John heard a panicked shriek echoing through the ship, and saw a waitress, hands pressed to her face, staring in horror at a motionless lump on the floor. The vacationers bustled over, John and Harold among them, and circled about the steely-eyed and lifeless body of one of their fellow passengers. The shaking waitress explained in a rush how she had stumbled over the prone form of Mr. Holmes as he lay, spread eagled, next to the buffet.

John shrank back behind his father and clung to the sleeve of his shirt. His knuckles brushed his father’s wrist, and he felt the strange, unearthly sizzle yet again. However, this time, the current flowed in the opposite direction: coming back out from under his father’s skin and retreating up John’s small hand.

Harold crumpled amidst the crowd of jittery onlookers, and John stared at his father’s graceless body, and somehow knew that he was gone for good this time.  
  


 

o—o—o

  
 

The ship’s doctor pronounced both men dead, though his look of disgruntled bewilderment said he knew full well that these were no ordinary deaths. John overheard him saying something about “foul play” to the first mate, and figured he’d better keep quiet if he wanted to escape the iron bars of prison.

He watched silently as the remains were zipped into big, black bags, and felt a chill course through his body. This was all his fault.

At the age of ten, John Watson labeled himself the perpetrator of a double homicide.  


 

o—o—o

  
  


Later that evening, as the sunset burned against the waves, John sat by the edge of the rail and cried quietly into his hands. He loved his father quite a lot, and his death was the most horrible shock John could have possibly imagined.

The “Miraculous Voyage” cruise staff had tended to him throughout the day, and he had felt cloistered and trapped by their too-friendly smiles and their concerned pats on the head.

They had tried to bring him ice cream, to lull him, soothe him, stop his crying. John had tried very hard to be good, but it was nearly impossible to stop the tears – and he had watched them slowly grow bored with his grief, heard their words become curt and impatient. He thought how easily they could all move on, how – with so little effort – they could push back the images of John’s father and Mr. Holmes lying limply on the ship’s polished deck.

When they had finally left him alone, John escaped to the farthest, most secret corner of the ship, and sat with his legs dangling over the edge as he stared out into the unending sea. He sniffled into his sleeve, eyes bright with unstoppable tears, and felt the air sticking in his lungs like honey – thick, and hard to choke down.

“Here,” a voice said out of the shadows, “take this.”

John turned to see a dark haired boy of about his age holding a handkerchief out to him. He stared, sniffling and hiccupping, and found that he couldn’t speak. He shook his head unhappily and curled up as much as he could, tucking his chin against his knees and wrapping his arms about himself.

“Alright,” said the other boy before sitting quietly next to John, clutching the handkerchief tightly in his pale hand.

They sat together as John’s sobs subsided and the flow of his tears slowed to a trickle. Neither of them spoke. Words seemed too heavy, too full of purpose and life.

Night moved slowly in on them, its darkness a welcome reprieve, and as the air grew colder John heard the other boy’s teeth chattering faintly, though he was doing his best to suppress the sound.

John took in a gulp of air and uncurled himself slightly, turning his head to look at the solemn-faced boy next to him.

“I’m John Watson,” he said, voice shaking, weighed down with grief and exhaustion. He felt hungry, desperate for a few normal words to shield him from the agony of his loss.

“Sherlock,” said the other boy, “Sherlock Holmes,”

John’s stomach plummeted at the sound of the boy’s name. “Your… your dad?”

“Yes,” said the other boy, and John’s pulse pounded out a rhythm against his ribcage.

He couldn’t speak, couldn’t think of anything to say that would soothe the ragged pain they both felt. Instead, he reached his hand out through the blanket of darkness, and placed it gently over the other boy’s trembling fingers. The hand beneath his stiffened momentarily, then relaxed under the heat of John’s damp palm

John took a deep, stuttering breath. “Mine too,” he said softly.

“Yes,” the other boy said again, his voice a dull, sad monotone.

They fell silent and leaned into each other as the stars bloomed against the summer night sky. Their hands and their grief linked them, and they sat, pondering the delicate balance of life, until orange tinged the horizon.

Then they stood, shaky from lack of sleep, and went their separate ways, neither knowing how that moment born of sorrow, guilt, and hormones would forever alter the course of their young lives.

**Author's Note:**

> So there you have it, the first installment in what (I hope) will one day be a fully grown story. Let me know if you have feedback.


End file.
